A transmitter may transmit signals, for example, acoustic waves, compression waves or other energy rays or waves, that may travel through subsurface structures. The transmitted signals may become incident signals that are incident to subsurface structures. The incident signals may reflect at various transition zones or geological discontinuities throughout the subsurface structures. The reflected signals may include seismic events. A receiver may collect data, for example, reflected seismic events. The data may be sent to a modeling mechanism that may include, for example, a data processing mechanism and an imaging mechanism.
Seismic events may include, for example, primary reflection energies (e.g., “primaries”) and multiple reflection energies (e.g. “multiples”). Primaries may be seismic events whose energy has been reflected off a surface one time. Multiples, in contrast, may be seismic events whose energy has been reflected off more than one surface, and thus reflected multiple times.
Primaries may be used to image subsurface geological structures, for example, transition surfaces or geological discontinuities. However, primaries in seismic events may be obscured by multiples. One goal of seismic data processing is to isolate primary reflections from seismic events for imaging subsurface structures. Primaries may be isolated by various data processing methods, for example, by multiple suppression mechanisms.
Modeling mechanisms may include, for example, two separate and in-line operations. Firstly, a data processing mechanism may read complete seismic data that typically includes primaries and multiples and may isolate primaries. Secondly, an imaging mechanism may construct images using the isolated primary data.
A need exists for a more efficient subsurface modeling system, one that more efficiently isolates primaries and provides images of subsurface features.